New Surprise EP and 8th host, producer and engineer Mike Shabb from Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He rose to prominence in the spring of 2018 with his full-length debut album, Northwave, and continued to make himself known with a final seven EPs and a few mixtapes, before being credited with engineering Boldy James’ fifth album, Fair Exchange No Robbery, and producing the fifth mentor Moses, who was credited with producing “Switches on Every,” from Hitler Wears Hermes X. Hood Olympics and Sewaside III are both solid in their own right, followed by Shabb Van Gogh and Fight the Power! & Vrai Rap Keb! Let Drega33 make The Lost Tapes.
The jazzy “Don Gargon” officially gets us talking about how he can’t be loaned out by anyone, while “Nike Tech” takes on a booming bap vibe about why people acting like him aren’t pushing hip-hop culture forward. “Kiss & Tell” adopts a more psychedelic sound and is about keeping the shit to himself before “Evidence Flicks” jumps over a naked saxophone loop and beats up anyone who’s with him.
“Dudududu” continues the second half of “The Lost Tapeson” with some soulful funky shit talking about dying for this shit because he’s in too deep; once “Jet2” continues crooning sampled techno calling out a guy who’s acting tough when everyone knows that’s not the case with him, closing track “World Go Round” takes on a guy who’s acting tough while everyone knows that’s not the case with him, closing track “World Go” Round” will take chinchilla soul and jazz and make the earth spin.
It was announced earlier this week that he was working on Sewaside IV, I don’t know if this is before or after Hood Olympics 2, but I didn’t expect Mike Shabb to drop another extended game so soon after Vrai Rap Keb! Becomes one of the greatest pieces of French hip-hop I’ve heard in a while. He takes a backseat to production, allowing Drega33 to draw inspiration from drumless, boom bap, chipmunk soul, jazz rap, psychedelia and funk to create his own style for some of Montreal’s finest musicians.
Rating: 9/10
